Water streams are easily contaminated with inorganic pollutants. Two common methods of contamination are industrial process manufacturing operations and seepage or breakthrough from disposal operations to ground water. Not so easy is the decontamination of these now polluted water streams.
Many procedures have been developed for extraction of inorganic pollutants. Some common procedures include ion exchange, electrodialysis, reverse osmosis, precipitation and electrolysis. However, present extraction procedures do not sufficiently satisfy all the problems associated with extraction of inorganic pollutants. The greatest problem is cost; the most common limitation of present extraction procedures is the expense incurred in achieving adequate decontamination.
A second problem is the extraction of numerous pollutants from one waste stream. Many present procedures are effective on simple waste streams but do not yield adequate results on more complicated water systems.
A third problem is the amount of water to be extracted. Many present procedures are designed to handle only limited volumes due to expense and selectivity.
Accordingly, it is a primary object of the present invention to provide inorganic pollutant decontamination processes which are inexpensive, effective on complicated water systems and adaptable to treat large volumes of contaminated water.